Excellent Radio interview with "Canada's Victor Lazzlo", Mark Steyn recorded on Friday of last week, by Wendy Sullivan of Girl on the Right. Some interesting comments by Mark on the legal strategy pursued by both Maclean's and the canadian islamic congress during the trial. For instance, while Maclean's had elected not to place Steyn on the stand, under the rules (if you'll pardon the expression) of the tribunal, Steyn's presence in the courtroom that day gave prosecuting attorney Faisal Joseph the right (if you'll pardon the expression) to "turn around" and himself call Steyn to the stand! Yet Joseph chose not to, even though he tried to disparage Maclean's for their choice in not having him testify (if you'll pardon the expression).

Regarding the CTV interview... it took place on the third day of the trial, and makes prominent reference to Andrew Coyne's diligentlive-blogging effortsfrom thecourtroom. Given that it took until the last lunch break of the last day of the trial, two days after this CTV broadcast, for the court to discover that Coyne was "broadcasting" direct from the trial, it suggests that precious few individuals within the circle of co-workers, friends, and family members of the tribunal, let alone the troika of the tribunal themselves, follow CTV very closely... or Maclean's... or much of the Canadian blogosphere... otherwise they would have known we were following their every word all week long.

(And Thank God they don't pay attention to non-CBC media, else we would have been denied even this brief glimpse into how ludicrous these proceedings have been)

VV, maybe they think we're "Islamophobes" but I assure those victimary death cultists, those Judeo-Chistophobes that our biggest phobia is "human rights"ophobia, the disease that has a positive need to create `victims`; and there will be no end of civil disobedience if they continue to go after writers. Their violent authoritarian world view is crumbling and the sooner they see it the better for all of us. But in any case it is a great moment for learning about what is realistic and what not in human affairs. I am happy to contribute to any such learning.

when the guilty verdict comes in, perhaps in a couple of months, Maclean`s can try to appeal, but there is no guarantee that a court will hear the appeal: the court has to believe that either an important point of law is at stake, or that there has been obvious error in the trial proceedings. Given that due process in the humans rights tribunal is more or less made up as they go along, pretending to pay deference to the rules of civil procedure, but ignoring them where they see fit, I really have no idea what an appeals court judge will think they have a right to do, and what not. Everyone is talking like an appeal will automatically be heard. I don`t know enough about the law to judge whether that is accurate or not though Maclean`s lawyers are clearly betting on this outcome.

My bottom line: we can`t rely on the courts to right an outrageous piece of law. The courts are themselves often deep in the `human rights` religion and in all the attendant excuses for victimary thinking. Ultimately, it is up to the people to demand the law be changed, if they want to live in a free society that doesn`t worship a victim cult.

I doubt it, but you`d have to ask a creative expert on torts and defamation and liability; it seems to me that anything that is duly legislated into existence will be allowed to override the common law.

I’m going to disagree with the assumption that Steyn will be found ‘guilty’ (I’m writing with no knowledge of the Tribunal’s ruling; hopefully I’m not behind on the news). One thing that stands out when reading Coyne’s reporting is that the complainants barely even made an attempt to prove what Steyn said was hateful. Look at the testimony by their own experts: Steyn uses stereotypes; Steyn over-generalizes; Steyn holds an uncharitable view of Islam; Steyn fails to provide context. None of this really approaches the concept of ‘hate-speech.’ As for the impact of the article? Apparently, some hurt feelings, though most of the complainants own expert witnesses hadn’t even been aware of the article. Oh, and then the piece-de-resistance: blog comments from Belgium. Talk about phoning it in.

Maybe Coyne left out some damning stuff, but I rather doubt that. What we end up with is a completely flimsy case in which even officials with a very broad view of hate-speech will have a lot of trouble delivering a guilty verdict. What I do think the complainants will get is some gentle lip-service from the Tribunals officials about the prevalence of Islamophobia and MacLeans unfortunate (though not illegal) decision to print Islamophobic articles without proper response. Now I doubt this will satisfy the crusading (Jihadist?) law students that cooked up this perverse complaint. It will, however, likely satisfy the officials of the Islamist networks that backed the complaint. The goal of the CIC is to stigmatize and repress (mainly) conservative discourse through accusations of bigotry and costly legal proceedings. They want to be a policing authority on the way in which Islam is discussed. In this sense they have ‘won’ and will continue to win until the laws on hate-speech are changed, narrowed, or broadly ignored.